The Labor government wants parliament to vote on a carbon farming scheme despite the details being far from finalised.
Senator for NSW and member of the senate Rural Affairs and Transport Committee, Fiona Nash, questioned department officials on the Carbon Farming Initiative during senate estimates.
The officials confirmed there is not yet a definition of `common practice’ for farming; the date for when regulations will be finalised is unknown; and there are still no positive and negative lists – what’s in and what’s out -for carbon activities.
“We have no idea yet what the methodologies for carbon abatement are going to be,” Senator Nash said.
“We were also told that what is deemed as `common practice’ in terms of farming may well be determined on a region by region basis. Yet the department could not say how this would work and what size the regions would be.
“Further, ABARES says its work on the CFI is due next month, after the legislation is to suppose to be voted on! ABARES officials said the timingwas the `nature of the contract with treasury’.”
The Agriculture Minister was asked by Senator Nash about the contract, as to whether government should have been able to consider data from ABARES regarding the impacts of the CFI before the legislation was brought to the parliament, to which he responded: `I’m not going to proffer any opinion`.
“This is a shambles. Here we have a complex yet incomplete piece of legislation before the parliament that concerns farmers,” Senator Nash said.
“The government arrogantly expects us to deal with this legislation before we have any understanding at all of how any of this is going to be quantified, and any impacts it will have on the agricultural sector.
“The absence of this information is extremely concerning. Farmers and regional communities deserve some answers before this legislation is even considered.”
There are currently no comments, be the first to post one.